Tuesday, July 22, 2014

Characters in meetings and negotiations

For the past six months I've attended numerous meetings with vendors, internal teams, external teams. The members included a range of profiles from junior engineers to all the way up to CEOs. It has been one of the best times in my professional career. Participating in these meetings made me realize what sets effective leaders from the others. Effective leaders need not come from C level title holders. neither is it a requirement. I've seen poor communicators and coordinators with tons of experience under their belt and some brilliant folks who are fresh in the industry. It is truly a potpourri of characters, experts and lousy engineers.
Some of the personalities I've come across:
I am an alpha male, so you listen to what I say
In a room full of people, this person was shouting on top of his lungs about something that no one cared a shit about. Actually in that particular instance, he was shouting about things that were already previously agreed up on, of which he chose not to participate earlier. Needless to say he lost the respect of others and was completely sidelined in further discussions. Unfortunately, it wasnt easy for either sides of the negotiation table as he holds a pretty high rank in the organization. Whew! What can I say? When you got to do it, you do it.
If you cant convince them, confuse them
When you come to a negotiation table, I think it is very important for you to be very open minded. You need to know what you really want to achieve and not get stuck up on petty details. However, there are some who come with one thing and only one thing in mind and cant get over it. They try hard to convince others that what they have in mind is the absolute solution. When they realize what they want is no longer valid or possible, they would take you on a storyline that is as complicated as the movie inception and leave you with nothing to work with. In my view they waste everyones time and should be fired immediately.
I dig my own hole
When you are negotiating it is important to know which side you are representing. You cannot represent both sides. You need to be sensitive to the other side, but not argue from their side too. However there are some people who lose sight of this point. These type of people are interesting. They start off by asking what they want from the other side. And then they have verbal diarrhea. They themselves say it is probably not feasible for the other parties to do what they are asking and retract their request. I've not yet figured out why they do this. In some cases, they seem to be proving that they know what it might entail to do what they are asking and may be want to prove they know a lot. In some cases, I think they are confused on what to ask. Or may be they are just not confident enough.
I need to show I am contributing
These folks are the most dangerous in my view. They just occupy the space/seats in the room, but have really no value. They try to insert themselves into every conversation by either just restating what others said or by directing the question to someone else. They are may be a tab bit better than the post masters. However they have no opinion nor idea on how to make the discussion more productive. I personally avoid calling these to the meetings and when they are there, I try to circumnavigate them.
Facilitators
Now we are coming to the section of people who make the meetings more productive. Facilitators are the folks who set the agenda, make sure things are progressing smoothly, keep track of time. Facilitators themselves may not have the capacity or the authority to make final decisions, but they play a big role in it. They facilitate both sides to come to the same page, redirect questions, confirm the agreements and make notes of it. If a discussion is going nowhere, they call it out and ask for time out or inject a different way to address it. They realize that it is ok to say we cannot agree now, but lets take an action item to follow up. Without facilitators no negotiation is effective.
Problem Solvers
These are the people who listen to both sides of the arguments and try to provide a solution that works for both. Sometimes, it may just be as simple as stating what you want and listening to the other party agreeing what you asked. Sometimes, it requires you to work through the plethora of issues brought up by the other party. Problem solvers are always tuned in to the other side's response and have clear idea of where they can compromise and where they can steer others to see what they want. Sometimes it requires being knack, sometimes need to play plain dumb. Playing dumb has many advantages, contrary to what people may think. Playing dumb allows you to know whether your opponents will take advantage of your seemingly gullible state. This will help you determine how to make your moves. If they exhibit that they indeed have your best interests, sometimes it is best to let them solve your problems. Problem solvers remember that they need to get the problem solved, either by themselves or from others. 
Decision Makers
Obviously these are the key people in a negotiation. Unfortunately, sometimes it is not so clear in a meeting who is a decision maker. You think I am kidding? Absolutely not, I've been in meetings where no one knows who the decision maker is. Sometimes it is on purpose. It is important to sense who is the decision maker in a negotiation. Decision makers need not be the problem solvers. They listen to the arguments put forth by problem solvers and the solutions and pick the best one and/or just approve what problem solvers come to conclusion. However, without their approval no solution is an agreement.

Of course not everyone falls into one of the above categories. Depending on the situation, the same person might need to play more than one of the roles (hopefully not the first three).

Im sure you can find these characters in any meeting you attend. Next time you are in a meeting, get a feel for who is who. Stop wasting time of the folks who don't matter in a meeting. And if you are one of the first three types, grow up and be more effective leader.